About Me

I'm married to my college sweetheart and we're raising two energetic boys! Can anyone relate to that? When I'm not home, I'm usually volunteering my time at our church or school. When I am home, I enjoy long walks with our dog and time with my family. My favorite hobby is rubber stamping and I love it when a card comes together just so. Whatever I do, I try to do my beary best! :)

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Saturday, October 3, 2009

Introducing Melody

In August Paper Makeup Stamps had a Custom Fairy contest and I was delightfully surprised to win. I had allowed myself to think about what kind of fairy would I want made if I got to choose, and I'm so glad I did! When Katie announced my name (after the shock and shrieking wore off and I could type again) I knew exactly what kind of fairy I wanted custom designed. Her name would be Melody and she would be singing to a bird. She would have ringlets and be wearing a simple dress and tiny shoes (always colored to match, haha!) I've just always loved to sing along with the radio or my CD's. It's my favorite part of any church service or program at school. And I've always loved being outside and watching little creatures go about their daily lives. This is the perfect idea of a Beautiful Day Fairy stamp for me.

I just love how Melody is drawn - she's exactly as I imagined her. Kudos to the illustrator Diem Pascarella! You can look at the PMS Blog for other sneak peek cards and she'll be released for sale on Wednesday night, October 7th during their release party. While you're checking Melody out, don't forget to leave comments there and have a chance to win the ENTIRE October release of stamps - now that's a lot of rubber happiness! AND as if that's not enough, Paper Makeup Stamps is having a 12 Week's Countdown to Christmas Sale every Saturday starting today for the next 12 weeks! Lots of exciting things going on over there. :)

And now for a couple cards! Melody is so much fun to color! I used a blender pen and ink and was thinking of Giselle from the movie "Enchanted", so this Melody has strawberry blond hair. :) I went with a pastel scheme of Certainly Celery, Bashful Blue and Apricot Appeal. Of course, I had to add dazzling diamonds glitter to her fairy wings. The saying is from PMS set Nature's Song. I like how the scalloped oval mimics the scallops on her dress and the cuttlebug music embossing folder gave me a great accent for the apricot panel. :)

In addition to mounted or unmounted rubber, Paper Makeup Stamps offers their Beautiful Day Fairies in digi form for the first month after they're released. So, for my second card I shrunk Melody down before I printed her. I wanted her to be the correct size to go with the cottage and willow tree (also from PMS!) After I colored her, again with blender pen and ink, I held my breath and oh so carefully cut her out. I sponged the grass and sky to add some texture and ripped a brown strip of paper to be a path leading from the cottage. The cottage was much easier to cut out after it was colored in and I added clear glaze pen to all the windows. I used markers to color in and "huff" the willow tree stamp and cut that out for the front yard. Then the clouds I just cut free-hand. As for the saying, well, there's this song that I grew up singing in our little country church and I just had it going through my mind and was humming/singing it while making this card. :) So, I decided why not print off the title from my computer. I used a small label nestie to cut and stencil the saying.

Here's a close-up view of Melody. Isn't she darling!? :) I used a glitter pen on her wings.